Information Alert: TFF Addresses Media Ignorance

Victoria Cobb, President
Thursday, October 16, 2008

Yesterday I had the privilege of addressing the media at the National Press Club in Washington, DC on the topic of values voters and their importance in Virginia. We were invited to brief the media by a member of the board of governors at the Press Club, the most prestigious media organization in the nation, who attended our recent pastor’s conference in Williamsburg. At that event he heard me talk about how the media does not understand values voters.

I was pleased to be joined yesterday by Delegate Brenda Pogge (R-96, Yorktown), Dr. Ron Jones, pastor of Immanuel Bible Church in Springfield, Robert Knight of the Media Research Institute and our own VP of Policy and Communications, Chris Freund.

In my remarks I reminded the journalists in attendance of the “new tradition come every election season, articles written assuming the demise of the “religious right.” In fact, a Lexus search of the months leading up to nearly every election that has taken place this century will find article after article predicting the demise of social conservatives. This year is no exception. Headlines like a recent one in the Virginian Pilot, one of Virginia’s largest newspapers: ‘Evangelical groups not as powerful as in the past within GOP.’”

This dismissive and almost wishful attitude by the media toward those voters for whom transcendent values like the sanctity of human life, traditional marriage and religious liberty actually matter reveals both a viscous bias against Judeo Christian values and a resulting ignorance of the importance of these voters.

One of the results of this ignorance and bias is an inability to measure the influence of values voters prior to elections. While polls can make adjustments for age, assumptions concerning “motivation,” etc., they cannot figure out how to poll evangelicals. That’s why, in 2004, we never heard the term “values voters” prior to election night – and it was values voters who swayed the election, to the surprise of the media.

As I said yesterday, “The fact of the matter is that there are an estimated 50-60 million evangelical voters in the United States. That block isn’t shrinking. There aren’t fewer evangelical voters today than there were four years ago. The difference between whether those voters turn out for an election or not is simple – it’s all about the candidate and the message.”

Let’s face it – if every conservative evangelical in American actually turned out to vote and voted Biblical values, they can sway every election in the nation, from school board to the presidency. The shame is that less than half of those potential voters are even registered, and too many that are don’t vote according to the values they claim.

To help educate and motivate values voters in Virginia, The Family Foundation Action is distributing a presidential voter guide (developed by the American Family Association), also available at www.tffaction.org. For multiple copies of voter guides for your church or community group please contact our grassroots coordinator John Smith at 804-343-0010 or john.smith@tffaction.org. Please get your copies today.

A link to the Family Research Council's Presidential and Congressional Voter Guides are also available on the Action web site.